2023-12-20 19:26:46
Employees will spend the Christmas holidays with a lump in their stomach. The Bobigny commercial court will render its decision on December 28 concerning the liquidation of Habitat, requested by the receivers due to the excessive financial difficulties of the company specializing in furniture, we learned from the employees’ lawyer.
“All parties were heard today, including myself on behalf of the community of employees”, indicated Maître Arthur-Léo Gandolfo before the Bobigny court, at the end of the hearing on Wednesday, two just weeks after Habitat was placed in liquidation. The brand, founded in 1964, has 25 stores. Habitat France currently employs 315 employees and generated a turnover of 65 million euros in 2022. The parent company, Habitat Design International, employs 68 people and had a turnover of 51.8 million in 2022.
But the current financial situation of the company leaves no hope for one of its employees, employed for 20 years at Habitat, who preferred to remain anonymous: “Everything is closed, what supplier could trust us today given the company’s situation? The name Habitat is no longer worth anything,” he laments. On November 30, Habitat announced that it was requesting its recovery, citing “profound financial difficulties, largely attributable”, according to it, “to previous faulty management and exacerbated by more recent factors” such as inflation but also “a significant drop in store attendance” and “internal social movements having disrupted activity”.
Stores closed for a week
“We had requested an expertise of the accounts in October 2022”, sensing “big problems” in the company, declared Ratiba Hamache, representative of the CGT within the brand. The stated objective of the group’s management via this procedure was to “stabilize the financial situation of the brand, which has never been profitable in France, and to ensure the long-term viability of Habitat”.
But only 10 days after it was placed in receivership by the Bobigny court, the judicial administrators announced last Friday in the CSE (social and economic committee) that they were going to request liquidation. “The conditions are not met for a continuation of the activity, there are more obstacles than opportunities. Potentially, there was an initial diagnosis problem, perhaps it would have been necessary to request liquidation straight away,” estimates a source close to the matter.
VIDEO. Habitat in suspension of payments: “I just want my money back”, testifies a customer who never received her sofa
If the court pronounces liquidation on December 28, “it’s the end, everything will be over, employees are dismissed, leases are sold, stocks are liquidated,” adds this source. For a week, the 25 Habitat stores have been closed, either “following a right of withdrawal exercised by employees, or because the directors decided to close due to attacks from dissatisfied customers” not receiving their orders, sometimes waiting for months, “and who sometimes served themselves directly in the store”, indicates an employee.
He recalls that “only 60% of November salaries have been paid”, that “many employees, including single mothers, are in great financial difficulty” and says he “wants a lot to Thierry Le Guénic”, the owner, for his business management. According to a source close to the matter, “nearly 9 million euros in deposits, according to initial estimates”, were paid by customers for the purchase of furniture and other products, their chances being slim of recovering their orders or their money in the event of liquidation.
Entrepreneur-investor Thierry Le Guénic bought Habitat in 2020 from furniture distributor Cafom. The same year, he acquired the clothing brand Burton of London, which was in receivership and had not found a buyer. He had also taken over the ready-to-wear brand Paule Ka and the lingerie brand Maison Lejaby, and was part of a trio of investors, including Stéphane Collaert, who bought Chevignon from Vivarte in 2019.
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